New Delhi: The Supreme Court will pronounce judgement Wednesday on the petitions challenging the Delhi High Court verdict bringing the office of the Chief Justice of India (CJI) within the ambit of Right to Information (RTI) Act.
A notice in connection with the judgement was uploaded on the Supreme Court website Tuesday afternoon. A five-judge headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi and comprising Justices NV Ramana, DY Chandrachud, Deepak Gupta and Sanjiv Khanna, will pronounce the judgement at 2.00pm.
The judgement was reserved April 4 on the appeals filed in 2010 by the Secretary General of the apex court and its Central Public Information Officer challenging the Delhi High Court and the Central information Commission’s (CIC’s) orders.
In 2010, in an unprecedented judgement, the Delhi High Court had ruled the RTI is applicable to the Chief Justice. The High Court observed the judicial independence was not a judge’s privilege, but a responsibility cast upon him. This judgement was construed as a personal attack on the then Chief Justice KG Balakrishnan, who had objected to divulging information in connection with judges under the RTI Act.
RTI activist SC Agrawal initiated the proceedings to bring the Chief Justice office under the transparency law. Prashant Bhushan, representing Agarwal, had contended that the top court should not judge its own cause.
Prashant Bhushan had insisted that the judiciary should not object to divulging the information, as the judges do not exist in different universe, and instead support transparency. He had said the public interest should be prioritized in comparison with personal interests if the person concerned is holding a public office. He had said that the judiciary is not free from ‘public scrutiny’.
Attorney General (AG) KK Venugopal, who was representing Supreme Court’s Central Public Information Officer (CPIO), had submitted that sharing information connected with Collegium, which is under the CJI office, would make judges and the government shy and destroy judicial independence. The CPIO is the authority tasked to respond to RTI queries related to the court.
IANS